[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 12]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 16937]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                 AMERICAN EMBASSY SECURITY ACT OF 1999

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                          HON. LYNN C. WOOLSEY

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                         Monday, July 19, 1999

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the State of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 2415) to 
     enhance security of United States missions and personnel 
     overseas, to authorize appropriations for the Department of 
     State for fiscal year 2000, and for other purposes.

  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Chairman, each year in the developing world, nearly 
600,000 women die from pregnancy-related complications. Maternal 
mortality is the largest single cause of death among women in their 
reproductive years. That's why we must support the Campbell/Gilman/
Gejdenson/Porter/Maloney amendment to H.R. 2415 which would remove the 
prohibition against the U.S. contribution to the United Nations Funding 
Population Fund (UNFPA).
  This amendment would authorize critical funding so that voluntary 
family planning services, like the UNFPA, can provide mothers and 
families in over 150 other countries new choices and new hope. Further, 
these services increase child survival and promote safe motherhood for 
nearly 900,000 women around the world. Without our support, women in 
developing nations will face more unwanted pregnancies, more poverty, 
and more despair.
  It is extremely hypocritical that those in Congress who would deny 
women in the developing world the choice of an abortion, would also 
seek to eliminate our support for family planning programs that reduce 
the need for abortion. Without access to safe and affordable family 
planning services, there will be more abortions, not fewer, and more 
women's lives will be put in danger.
  I wish that today we could be voting on legislation allowing our 
foreign aid dollars to pay for a full range of reproductive health 
services, not just the limited services that barely get a right-wing 
seal of approval. But what is most important now is that the House of 
Representatives oppose the Smith anti-family amendment and support the 
Campbell/Gilman/Gejdenson/Porter/Maloney amendment to restore funding 
to the UNFPA.
  Let's keep the doors of more family planning clinics open for the 
women who are desperately in need of this information and these 
services. We will reduce the number of abortions and improve the lives 
of women and their children. I urge my colleagues to support the UNFPA.

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